Beyond Data

Episode 2 Teaser

For the past decade Beyond Data Podcast host Ret Talbot has been a freelance journalist and science writer reporting on fisheries at the intersection of science and sustainability. He frequently uses the hashtag #datamatter because, well, they do. But what happens when the data simply don’t exist, are insufficient or unavailable? What happens when so-called alternative facts are considered just facts and people operate under the impression that the plural of anecdote is indeed data? How do we reach consensus when everyone espouses his or her own data—his or her own facts? In the Beyond Data Podcast, Talbot and his guests go where he's often been unwilling to go in his reporting--beyond data.

The second episode of the Beyond Data Podcast airing later
this month takes a deep dive into meal kit delivery services and
how they are shaping the sustainable seafood space.

The data show that eating more seafood is good for you,
especially when cooked at home, but Americans often hesitate to buy
it outside of a restaurant setting. In part, that’s because cooking
fish at home can be daunting, but there are also plenty of other
reasons why people may avoid the seafood counter.

A growing number of Americans want to know where their food
originates for reasons ranging from health to socio-economic and
environmental sustainability. When it comes to seafood, a lack of
transparency makes it difficult to source seafood with
confidence.

Meal kit delivery services like Blue Apron, Hello Fresh and Sun
Basket are uniquely positioned to radically change Americans’
relationship to seafood. These services remove many of the barriers
to cooking fish at home by providing step-by-step directions and
precisely measured ingredients—ingredients that they frequently
claim are sustainable.

The leading meal kit delivery services talk a lot about how they
are reinventing what they see as a broken food system in America.
In the case of seafood, they frequently talk about how the meal kit
can connect consumers with domestic, sustainably harvested and
farmed fish and shellfish, which is a big deal considering that
upwards of 90% of the seafood Americans consume is imported from
countries lacking both the sustainability and food safety
regulations to which US fisheries and farms adhere.

While this certainly sounds good on the surface, some industry
observers wonder if it’s too good to be true, especially given the
competitive nature of the space and some of the challenges meal kit
delivery services are encountering. Are there data to back-up the
sustainability claims made by these companies—claims that are often
front and center in marketing materials aimed at sustainably-minded
consumers, who increasingly make up a larger percentage of their
target audience? What does it mean when Blue Apron claims “100%
sustainable seafood” or when Hello Fresh uses the word
“sustainable” more than 600 times on its website?

I’m Ret Talbot, inviting you to join my guests and me when we go
beyond the data and take a deep dive into meal kit delivery
services and sustainable seafood in the next episode of the Beyond
Data Podcast coming this Thursday to
Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. I hope you’ll
join us, and, if you missed
Episode 1 on New York’s oyster toadfish fishery, this would be
a great time to give it a listen and subscribe so every episode of
the Beyond Data Podcast will be delivered to you automatically.

About the Podcast

The Beyond Data Podcast blends investigative journalism and scientific inquiry to tell unresolved stories where anecdote may overwhelm data and the answers are far from clear. Whether those data don’t exist or have been all but obfuscated by “alternative facts,” in each episode, award-winning journalist and science writer Ret Talbot takes a deep dive beyond the data into a complex and often controversial story. By bringing together myriad voices, the Beyond Data Podcast encourages listeners to look at the world in new and often surprising ways with an eye to promoting dialog and informing the choices we make in our daily lives.